A different type of All-American

By age 9, Mitchel Gusman was playing Pop Warner football, had just stopped playing soccer year-round and was in search of a third sport.

"I needed another sport to play in the off-season," said Gusman, now 17. "My dad found a flier for Fullerton Youth Rugby, I went out and I loved it."

The La Habra resident continued playing multiple sports up until high school. He played freshman football at Servite before transferring to Bishop Amat of La Puente. He put on the pads his sophomore and junior years, but decided his senior year would be solely dedicated to one sport: rugby.

La Puente doesn't offer the sport; the senior plays club.

As a member of the Southern California Griffins – an All-Star rugby club – Gusman traveled to Colorado for a national tournament this past summer.

Scouts and coaches from USA Rugby were on hand looking to fill slots for their High School All-American team. After an impressive weekend on the field, Gusman was one of more than 120 athletes invited to USA Rugby's winter tryout on the campus of Arizona State in December.

He arrived in Tempe the day after Christmas and practiced for five days with high school rugby players from across the country. Two weeks after returning home from the tryouts, Guzman was notified he was one of 24 players named to USA's High School All-American team.

"I was super excited," Gusman said. "I had been working so hard: going to the gym, running probably six times a week after practice. It just felt good to show that all my hard work paid off."

Just weeks after finding out he had made the team, Gusman and his teammates traveled to Las Vegas for the USA Sevens Tournament earlier this month.

Despite having only practiced together for five days in Tempe a month and a half before, Gusman and team USA played as if they had been teammates for years. The team capped off an undefeated weekend by defeating British Colombia, 17-5, in the High School Division final at Sam Boyd Stadium in front of 30,000 fans.

"It was crazy," Gusman said. "You're very nervous before the game, but once you get into the stadium, it was cool to see everyone who was going to be watching you. And when the game started, you don't even realize that all those people were watching.

"I was amazed at how well we all clicked. I really think it was the coaching and the skill level of all the players. It was very easy for us to just click."

Next up for USA Rugby is a trip across the pond to play in the Rosslyn Park Sevens Tournament in London. Gusman was one of the 15 team members selected to make the trip to play in the highly-competitive tournament.

"I've never been to Europe, so I'm excited," Gusman said. "There's going to be a lot of good competition. I know rugby is a sport kids start playing at a young age in England. So it'll be a good challenge for us."

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